Key West

by Stella Cameron

  “If he were alive,” Romano said, “I would have heard from him by now. And I didn’t lie when I said I got a call, a tip, that Frank died soon after he was abducted.”

  Billy gave a theatrical sigh. “What a pity, what a shame. Call the waitress.”

  “I have also received proof of his death. You’ve drunk much more than enough.”

  “I’ll call her.” She waved her glass in the air. “You will get Sonnie away and talk to her. At the same time, I’ll be with Chris Talon, persuading him to move on.”

  Romano had never felt more threatened. “How do you think you will do this, Billy?”

  “Why, Romano”—she chucked him under the chin—“don’t you trust me? First I thank him for looking after my little sister; then I point out that there’s someone much more worthy of his attention.”

  “Call me—do do do—im-pet-u-ous. Oh, yeah, I’m—do do do—im-pet-u-ous.”

  Sonnie paused beside the piano at the Rusty Nail and screwed up her face at Chris. “Cute,” she said. “You ought to write songs, but you might want to put them to original music. You can really play, Chris. I love listening to you.”

  He reached up and crossed his wrists on top of the piano. “I love everything about you. Top that.”

  Frank might have been dead, yet she was enjoying the attention of another man. Yes, she was enjoying every moment of it. And attention was a weak word for what they’d shared last night. “I don’t think we’ll hold a contest here.”

  “Aha. But we will hold one somewhere else?”

  “I’m supposed to be working. And the day’s more than half over. Shouldn’t you be out asking some more questions?”

  “I will be, boss. I’m waiting for some calls. One call, to be precise.” He wasn’t joking around anymore. “Sonnie, while I’m gone you have to be where I can be sure you’re safe. Roy and Bo can take good care of you if you’ll let them. Will you?”

  “Υοu frighten me. I can’t stay—” A man on the opposite side of the street caught her attention. His impressive gut had nothing to do with the feeling he’d given her. His absorption did. He was watching her through the open shutters of the Nail. His head was shaved.

  “What is it?” Chris asked, whipping around to see what she was looking at. “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You can cut the lies, lady. We’re dealing with serious stuff.”

  The man had been completely still, but he turned away and was lost in the surging crowds along Duval. “I think I just saw the man who threatened me that night. The drunk. He turned up at that motel.”

  Chris got to his feet. “And you stood there without telling me again?” He came from behind the piano.

  “He’s gone now. You’d never find him.”

  Chris curled his tongue over his upper teeth. What he was thinking didn’t need to be said.

  “I know I should have said something at once, but I’m afraid to heap on any more supposed events. If you don’t already think I’ve got an overactive imagination, I don’t know why. He’s not important. Just a man at loose ends. I thought he’d have left Key West by now.”

  “Υou hoped he would have.”

  Snapping his fingers to a rhythm only he heard, swinging an imaginary partner, Bo danced toward them. “Okay if I ask a question?” he said_

  “You will anyway,” Chris told him.

  “Most certainly. You haven’t spent much time in your luxury quarters of late. Any comments about Aiden’s limousine being parked out there? And there being no sign of Aiden? Did you send him on a mission?”

  “Nope.”

  Sonnie looked sharply at Chris. “Did something happen between you two?”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  She persisted. “Chris. Why is Aiden’s car out back if Aiden isn’t anywhere around?”

  “Maybe he wanted to give me his pride and joy as a sop to his conscience.”

  Whatever spoke to Bo’s musical tastes set his head gyrating from side to side. “Don’t know why you put up with this bozo, Sonnie,” he said, closing his eyes. “He’s mean and tough. He alienates his friends. He doesn’t appreciate having the best brother in the world.”

  “I don’t know where Flynn is, okay? I told him to get lost and apparently he complied.”

  “Why would you do that?” Sonnie said.

  The way Chris’s lips pressed together didn’t inspire warm sensations.

  “We had a disagreement,” he said. “Bo, I need to follow up a few leads. I’ve asked Sonnie to stay with you. That means—”

  “What leads?” she asked when she recovered from the casual way he mentioned them. “What have you found out?”

  “Later, ma’am. Bo, without wanting to send too much fear into anyone around here, this lady must not be allowed to leave this place. Not until I’m with her. Do we understand each other?”

  Every inch of Bo moved to his music. “I’ve got it. Roy’ll get it, too. Our Sonnie may say she doesn’t intend to get it at all.”

  “I want to know why Aiden would leave his car behind,” Sonnie said. “He loves that thing. Chris, I’m worried about him.”

  “Don’t be. Ornery SOBs like Aiden have more lives than a cat.”

  “I distinctly heard that boy say he’d already used up eight lives,” Bo said. “That could mean he’s on his last one. I agree with Sonnie. We want to know where Aiden is.”

  “Shee-it.”

  “Ladies in the house,” Bo said, still dreamy. “If Roy hears you, I’ll pity you.”

  “Phone,” Roy yelled from behind the bar. Pep, the small, golden-skinned woman who helped out during the day, ducked out with a cordless in hand. She trotted to give it to Chris and said to Bo, “I’ m off now. Got to feed that man of mine. So long, Sοnnie. Don’t take anything from these guys.”

  “I won’t,” Sοnnie told her.

  Chris listened and injected occasional “Yeahs.” He clicked off the instrument and set it down on top of the piano.

  “Get that back over here,” Roy shouted, letting them know he was watching every move.

  Picking up the phone again, Chris angled his head to indicate they should all go to the bar. “Give me a few minutes, will you?” he said when both Bo and Sοnnie had joined Roy on the other side. “I won’t be more than a few minutes. Honest. I gotta check that pest Flynn’s vehicle.”

  “Why?” Sοnnie made fists on the counter. “What was that call about? Don’t keep anything from us, Chris.”

  “I need a few minutes on my own, okay? I’ll come back and fill you in.”

  “Chris—”

  “Please, Sonnie. We’re wasting time here, and I don’t think that’s a luxury we can afford.”

  “Go,” she said, but she could scarcely stand the suspense. Chris didn’t argue. He left by the back door.

  Bo let out a huge breath and slumped with his elbows on the bar. “That man will be the death of us all. So much goes on inside him, yet he is still so secretive.”

  Sonnie’s thoughts exactly. She didn’t want to hang around waiting for Chris to come back when he felt like it. “It’s quiet this afternoon,” she said, striving for nonchalance.

  “Not that quiet,” Roy said promptly. “Not quiet enough for you to find an excuse to slide out of here. So if you’ve got any ideas, forget ‘em. Right, Bo?”

  “You got it. Sonnie, Chris wants the best for you. He cares about you, and that’s something we haven’t seen in a long time, not since—”

  “Not in a long time,” Roy put in. “And if you leave, I’m just going to have to go with you.”

  She took glasses from a dish crate and slid them into the wooden racks overhead.

  “Sonnie?” Roy said.

  “I’ll stay put. Thank you for caring about me.”

  “We do,” Bo said. “And we think we’re lucky to get the opportunity. Nasty weather forecasts coming in again. What d’you think, Roy? Are we gonna get hit this year?”

  Roy ducked his head to squin
t outside. “I’ve got a feeling we may. I always feel the storms are playing with us. They try to make us careless, then sock it to us. We’ll just have to keep an ear to the ground. Anybody ask that guy over there what he wants? Too good to serve himself, I guess.”

  Grateful for the diversion, Sonnie took the man’s order for a beer and a tequila shooter. He was tall and bleached blond, his eyes hidden behind dark glasses, and dressed entirely in black leather—including a black leather jerkin unzipped almost to his navel. His chest bore an impressive array of tattoos. One ear was edged with at least a dozen rings, a small cross dangled from another piercing in his eyebrow, and there were two rings in his right nostril. He gave the impression of not welcoming small talk, so she didn’t give him any.

  “Sonnie,” Roy said when she was back behind the bar, “how much has Chris told you about himself?”

  The question caught her off guard and she blinked several times.

  “Not much?” Roy said. “That doesn’t surprise me. You think he’s a hard son of a…beechnut, don’t you? He’s had some hard knocks, but his real problem is that he’s too quick to take the blame for other people’s actions. Not that he’ll listen to anyone who tries to tell him that.”

  Sonnie checked the bar. Despite Roy’s protests to the contrary, the place was all but deserted. A couple sat near the windows, and the blond man occupied his table with evident surly uninterest in his surroundings. “I don’t think Chris would like it if he knew we’d talked about him.”

  “To hell—he isn’t here, so he doesn’t know what we’re talking about,” Bo said. “And Roy and I have decided he needs help. He needs to stop hiding from himself. No way can a man come to terms with himself as long as he pretends there’s nothing wrong with him.”

  “He’s a hell of a detective,” Roy said. “They fought to keep him in New York, but the man’s got concrete between his ears when it comes to listening to what other people think of him. He blames himself for something that wasn’t his fault, and he won’t listen to anyone who tries to make him more objective. You sure he didn’t say anything about what happened in New York?”

  Sonnie shook her head. She glanced repeatedly at the back door. “I think Chris has to decide to tell me himself, if he ever wants to,”

  “He won’t decide,” Roy said.

  “Because he won’t forgive himself,” Bo added.

  “We want you to know this because it’ll make it easier for you to understand when he gets real moody,” Roy said. “He was on a case. Called into a pusher’s place on a domestic violence complaint. Chris had been aching for a reason to go in there. The pusher had beaten up his wife and scared his kids—if they were his kids—into gibbering balls in the corners.

  “The wife’s sister was there—and her boyfriend. Evidently the boyfriend and the pusher were real tight. The sister didn’t look so hot, either. She had a face that had probably looked a whole lot better before it needed so many stitches.

  “Chris rounded up the guys—while the women begged for them to be released. Why would any woman behave like that?” He shook his head and obviously didn’t expect an answer. “Chris got the handcuffs on. He’d called for his backup—who was Aiden Flynn—and Aiden got in at a trot. Then Chris went in a back room. The place was filthy. Stank. On the floor between a bed and the wall he found an unconscious baby, about six months old. The kid was covered with bruises. Chris went mad. He loves kids. He wanted his own, but Beatty was never quite ready for them. Beatty was his wife. When he saw this little guy who’d obviously suffered so much, he just lost it.

  Tears slid down Sonnie’s cheeks and she didn’t do anything to stop them. “I don’t blame him.” Chris had never mentioned that he liked children.

  “Neither do I,” Roy said. “But he turned into a vigilante and all but conducted a trial on the spot. Outcome? Seemed the mother had beaten the kid to silence so her old man wouldn’t get even madder. Chris left the pushers to Aiden and hauled the woman off. Got her charged in night court and threw her in the pokey.

  “She had excuses. Explanations. She admitted hitting the kid, but said he was okay when she left him. He was asleep.

  “Chris didn’t believe her, and he didn’t have any difficulty finding support for his theory. Long story short. The baby died. The mother was convicted of murdering her own child and sent up.”

  “And she got out on some technicality,” Sonnie said. “I don’t know how anyone can be a conscientious policeman. They can’t get the courts to keep criminals behind bars.”

  Bo and Roy looked at each other. “The woman died in jail,” Bo said. “Hanged herself with a bedsheet. And it turned out she was covering for her sister and the boyfriend. They were occupying another bed in the same room with the kid. When he cried, they made sure he shut up.”

  “And they didn’t come forward with the truth?”

  “Not until the mother died and the sister finally found some remorse. Anyway, Chris blames himself one hundred percent. That’s why he left the force. He says he murdered that woman. That was over two years ago. The moment he said he was getting out of NYPD, Beatty divorced him. Apparently she found being a cop’s wife glamorous. Wife of a washed-up cop didn’t appeal. She remarried within a few months. Another cop. This one had been helping Beatty for some time. He kept her company through the lonely nights when Chris was on duty.”

  Sonnie passed the backs of her hands over her eyes. She didn’t know Chris had returned until his arm settled on her shoulder and his deep voice said, “I just got the end of that. There was no reason for you to know any of it. I’m sorry Roy and Bo opened their big mouths and spilled my business.”

  His tone chilled her. She looked up in time to see his cold face and the angry eyes with which he regarded Roy and Bo. “When I got down here I was pretty shaken up. If I hadn’t been, I wouldn’t have unloaded on you. I’m trying to forget. I didn’t want Sonnie to know any of it. Not ever.”

  “You hypocrite,” Sonnie said. Anger hadn’t been the feeling she expected. “You want to know everything about me and I’ve confided in you. But you’ve got to be the big, strong guy who can deal with his own ghosts. You don’t need anything from anyone.”

  Roy touched her arm and said, “Go easy, Sonnie. I spoke out of turn.”

  “You did not,” she told him. “You love your brother and that’s why you told me. You think I can help him. You’re wrong. He’d never let me.” And she wished she could be far away without having to deal with what she felt, the disappointment, the embarrassment at her foolishness in thinking he’d begun to rely on her, to want to be with her.

  “Now see what you’ve done, bozo,” Bo said. “The best thing that ever came your way, and you’re managing to turn her off.”

  “I do want to be with you,” Chris said, ignoring Sonnie’s resistance and turning her toward him. “I would have told you when it seemed right. You’re going through heavy times. We’ve got to deal with you, not me.”

  “Too easy, Chris. Too quick. Don’t you know anything about me? I don’t want pity. I want help, yes, but not pity. And maybe it would help me if I knew you had bad things to cope with, too.”

  Roy and Bo drifted away.

  Chris leaned to drive a thumbtack deeper into a postcard on the burlap-covered wall. “I’m sorry,” he said. “But I repeat: until tonight it hasn’t been about me. I did tell you I’d dropped out. You must have known I had a reason. I’m a shit. That’s the reason. Because of my hard head, a woman died. It wasn’t

  enough that she’d lost her baby. Ι had to hound her, drive her into a corner until she’d have said anything to shut me up. So I got a confession. And it was a lie. I killed her, and I’m never going to forget it. I’m trying to forgive myself—at least enough to carry on. And you’re helping me with that.”

  She could scarcely swallow. “How could I have known what you’re going through? Chris, I’m sorry. Let me in. Let me be here for you. I need you; you know that. Would it be so bad for you to need me,
too?”

  His hands came to rest on the sides of her face. He leaned his brow on hers. “I do, Sonnie. I thought you knew that by now. I don’t even want to think about not having you where I can get to you.”

  “You weren’t to blame,” she told him. “You weren’t, Chris.”

  He shook his head. “Let it be, darlin’. I appreciate what you want to do, but let it be.”

  Sonnie placed her fingers on his mouth. Her body quickened just because he was near. “Will you let me know when you’re ready to deal with it?”

  “I’ll let you know.” He kissed her. She felt air currents from the fans whirring overhead, and smelled Chris’s clean skin. And she stood on her toes to kiss him more deeply.

  His hands were on her bottom, holding her against him. She wasn’t the only one aroused.

  “What does it take to get a drink around here?”

  Sonnie slowly lowered her heels to the floor, slowly allowed their mouths to part. And when they had, she looked at his lips and wanted right back where she’d been.

  The sound of a glass banging on the bar opened Chris’s eyes. Sonnie grimaced at him and he showed his teeth in a silent growl before turning around. “You got a problem?” Chris asked the blond man who had managed to find enough energy for a walk to the bar. “Where I come from, interruptin’ a lady and gentleman at a time like this wouldn’t be considered respectful behavior. No, sir. I think you should apologize; then we’ll talk about a drink.”

  “Well, I’m mighty sorry if I’ve offended you,” the man said. “I surely do ask you to pardon me, sir. Now, get me a goddamn beer and join me at that table. You too, Sonnie. If we don’t have even more trouble than we thought we had, then my name isn’t Wally—Aiden Flynn, to you.”

  Twenty-five

  These were the moments Aiden lived for. “You’re losing your touch, partner,” he said when Sonnie was seated in the booth and Chris was in the process of sliding in beside her. “You looked right at me. Geez, I know I’m good, but wasn’t there anything familiar about me?”

  “I did wonder about the smell, but we Southerners set great stock in good manners.”